Star Wars Episode 351: The Dying Flame
by Michael Raziel
Summary: Jedi Purge era fic, part 1 of an ongoing serial. Feedback welcomed!


Star Wars Episode 3.5.1: The Dying Flame

The shroud of the dark side has fallen over the galaxy. Though the carnage of the Clone Wars has finally come to an end, the valiant Jedi Knights -- gaurdians of peace and justice throughout the Galactic Republic -- face extinction in the wake of Order 66. Betrayed by their goverment and their troops, the scattered survivors search desperately for a place of refuge . . .

As soon as her battered starfighter reverted to realspace, Padawan Lyrielkill'ika knew she would never make it to the planet below. The hyperdrive ring attached to her Eta-2 interceptor had taken several long range hits as she'd fled the Ralltir System, and her readouts had been fluctuating wildly throughout the entire trip.

Then, just minutes before her course was complete, the port side engines failed completely and began venting vapor into the swirling blue chaos of hyperspace. Emergency cutoffs had activated, isolating the damaged components and pulling the fighter out of hyper, but too late -- now the cockpit was ringing with alarms, and she could smell something burning behind the readout of her targeting computer.

Lyriel felt despair rising up through her discipline, and fought it the only way she knew how: by remembering the Code_. There is no death; there is only the Force_. She began throwing switches, disengaging the ring and shutting down everything except life support, her sublight engines, and the fighters comm system. "R4, damage report. Can you hold us together long enough to land?"

**_Negative_.** Vibrations through the ships chassis carried the astromechs mournful trill into the cockpit, giving her the gist of the droids message before the text appeared on her screen.** _Internal temperature readings indicate a progressive burn in the wiring. Containment procedures ineffective. Estimate critical systems failure in 4.773 minutes standard. Overall structural integrity insufficient for successful atmospheric insertion._**

"Sithspit." She shunted energy from the fighters weapon capacitors into the sublight drive, knowing even as she did so that it wouldn't be enough. The fourth planet of the Kemparas system was 30 klicks off her bow, more than 20 minutes away at best possible speed. She would be frozen and suffocated in the cockpit long before the ship tore itself apart in the ionosphere.

Under different circumstances, she might have commed the Jedi outpost on the planet and gotten a rescue ship to meet her in deep orbit -- even given the transmission delay, it might have meant an even odds chance of survival. As it stood, the out post would need every ship it had if they hoped to evacuate. The clones Lyriel and her master has commanded until just a few hours ago were far from stupid; they could plot a straight line as well as anyone in the galaxy, and the temple on Kemparas was not a secret. The _Victory_ and her battle group would be here in minutes. When they arrived, any Jedi in the system would be slaughtered.

Lyriel was not about to let that happen. She'd watched helplessly through her fighters sensors as an orbital strike from the prototype Star Destroyers turbolasers vaporized Tau-Se, the human Jedi master who'd been like a father to her for as long as she could remember. She'd flown for her life to evade the treacherous attacks of the ARC 170's that moments before had been her friends, channeling the Force so deeply that she had no memory of how she'd gotten to her hyperdrive ring outside Ralltir's gravity well. Now, as she shot through the void in her disintegrating ship, the only thing sustaining her was the determination that the clones would kill no more Jedi today.

_Well,_ she corrected herself as she saw R4's countdown dip below four minutes, _Maybe ONE more._

"R4, record the following and broadcast on priority channel Aleph." she took a deep breath to force the fear from her voice, peripherally thankful that the channel was voice only. That way, whoever recieved the signal wouldn't see her lekku twitching. "Attention Kemparas control, attention. Padawan Lyrielkill'ika declaring emergency code nine one three. Repeat, emergency code nine - thirteen. My fighter is damaged, I won't be able to make it to you. You have hostile Republic forces inbound. Estimated unit strength is one Cruiser grade capital ship, fifty plus starfighters, and three _Acclimator_ class assault ships. The clones have --"

Her voice caught in her throat as R4 trilled a familiar warning tone. Her sensors were off, but she didn't need them to see the vast wedge shaped bulk of the _Victory_ as it flickered into realspace between her and the planet, surrounded by it's smaller support vessels. She glanced at her readout and read the droids message: _**Warning: Victory is launching starfighters. Twelve hostiles inbound, estimate two minutes to intercept. Cruiser and support vessels making flank speed toward the planet.**_

"May the Force be with us all." Lyriel brought her weapons and shields back on line, hitting the switches with numb fingers. "R4, keep me breathing as long as you can. They might get the temple, but we're going to hit them as hard as we can."

With that, she firewalled the throttle, ignoring the way the aft of her fighter shook at the stress. The Force flowed into the controls through her hands, making the fighter an extension of her will, narrowing her entire universe down to the ship around her and the targets in front of her.

She killed six of them before the lack of oxygen in the cockpit finally dragged her into unconsciousness.


End file.
